This research is based on the social approach of design, through the satisfaction of individual and collective human needs, understanding this approach as the main actor in the mediation of the economic, social, and sustainable development of the community. It is intended to analyze the different theoretical positions that supports the construction of an applied methodological guide, for the generation of sustainable tourism models, from the social dimension of the design and practice of community ethnographic research methods. This methodology is a resource for reflection on the social imaginaries, present in the relationship between the surroundings of Laguna de Colta, an ancestral iconic lagoon in the Ecuadorian Highlands with great tourism potential, and the community that inhabits it. The result was a methodological guide that seeks the viability of the practice of design, in little explored contexts, contemplating historical, community and political criteria, for the construction of interaction structures as a catalyst for sustainable tourism.